Letters to the Daily Telegraph

Sir - I fear that Tony Blair's speech (report, August 2) does little to create a more positive future for the Middle East or for the world.

As soon as he uses the expression "arc of extremism", it is clear that he still understands little about international relations. The phrase "arc of extremism" creates a confrontational mindset that assumes a struggle. The rest of his speech is in the tone that we have to win over opinion in the Middle East - not that we have to learn mutual understanding, respect and co-existence. We cannot just talk about being friends with the "moderates", those who think like ourselves, we must understand the others as well.

What Mr Blair must understand is that there is an arc of fear in the Middle East: people who feel threatened by Britain, the United States and Israel. And out of that fear there grows an arc of anger and an arc of hostility and ultimately that is how the arc of extremism emerges.

How can he seriously talk about promoting our values when the only values which seem to be in evidence are the principle of might is right and the disregard for the standard international norms?

Clem McCartney, Benone, Northern Ireland

Sir - The Prime Minister's Los Angeles speech, while moving in the right direction, does not go far enough.

Hearts and minds will not be won over, and there will never be peace in the Middle East, until the more moderate forces in the Muslim world, including the governments of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, are obliged to stop their incitement of hatred of Israel and the West, either directly or through their state-controlled media. This is a tough assignment, which the Prime Minister can start at home by applying zero tolerance to those poisoning the minds of Muslims here in the UK.

The war on terror, however, is not a cold war and, with the looming shadow of a nuclear Iran, we cannot afford the luxury of a battle of ideas. Germany and Japan did not become democracies by the force of persuasion. The existential threat that they presented to the free world could only be overcome by force of arms. This is a tragedy that only Israel today truly understands.

Michael Metliss, London NW3

Sir - You report (August 3) that the Tories are divided on Middle East policy. Nothing new there. Tony Blair's speech in Los Angeles calling for a new approach from the West to militant Islam takes the debate a step further - he is clearly one step ahead of the Tories.

The Tories need an open debate about the future position of foreign policy, which puts the security and prospects of Britain first, rather than trying to pick up crumbs from the White House table, where they seem rather too keen to sup.

Timothy Stroud, Salisbury, Wilts

Lebanon's fate

Sir - Boris Johnson (Comment, August 3) refers to Lebanon as a failed state. A generation ago, Lebanon was the only functioning democracy in the Arab world, renowned for its tolerance, strongly pro-Western, with its French culture and American university. It was destabilised by the arrival of thousands of Palestinians, armed by the Syrians, who used the resultant bloodshed as an excuse for their invasion.

The West loudly trumpeted the Cedar Revolution, which finally ejected the Syrians. Visiting Beirut in April, I was struck by the incredible recovery. A single bombed-out building was preserved as a reminder of the state of much of the city a few years before. Everywhere, the talk was of how the democratically elected government could gain control of the last major militia still carrying arms, Hizbollah.

While Syrian arms, paid for by Iran, had been poured into Hizbollah during the Syrian occupation, its grip on the Shia populations in the south was actually slipping. Hizbollah was really struggling to make the Shaaba Farms border dispute (involving a few miles of bleak hillside) a rallying point.

Israel had to react to the seizure of two soldiers and the early rocket attacks. But by using such disproportionate force, Israel has escalated the conflict exactly as Damascus and Teheran wished. It has also converted a group hated by the Lebanese majority into national heroes.

The shoots of Lebanese democracy have been stamped on and the country's economic infrastructure devastated. It is not only Israel which will have to cope with the profound fury ripping right across the moderate Islamic world at this grotesque act of bullying.

Julian Brazier MP (Con), London SW1

Credit too easy

Sir - It is a bit rich of Lloyds TSB's chief, Eric Daniels, to complain about its customers' attitude to debt (Business, August 3). Our parents' generation were not bombarded with offers to lend them huge and unaffordable amounts. For a loan, you had to see the bank manager personally and prove to him (always him) that you could afford it. Nowadays, you can bankrupt yourself on the telephone in an afternoon.

In 1983, aged 19, I approached my bank for a loan to buy a car to get to work. Despite being in secure employment, never having an overdraft, and showing my repayment plan, my request was turned down. Only my father's intervention secured the loan. Now every day brings post offering to lend me money. When my son reaches the same age in six years' time, I doubt he will have the same trouble securing a loan, whatever his employment status or financial position.

There has been a seismic change in attitude towards debt over the past 20 years, but the UK banking sector and its lending policies have to take prime responsibility for this.

Diana Church, Epping, Essex

NHS funding does not benefit patients

Sir - The difficulties faced by Ipswich Hospital (report, August 2) have thrown light on the frustrating nonsense that has resulted from the new ways of funding healthcare providers.

The primary care trusts now have to make a contract with the hospital for the volume of work they can afford and will pay for in a year. This includes the number of patients and the sort of treatment. At the same time, the Government sets standards for waiting times from referral by the GP to treatment by the hospital. Thus, if a patient is referred, that patient has to be treated within a certain time. The problem now arises when the GPs, governed by the PCT, refer more patients than the contract has agreed. The trust is damned if it treats the patients, because they will not be paid for the excess numbers treated, and damned if they don't, because waiting time limits will be breached and the trust further penalised by removal of "stars" and the prospects of self-governance of its affairs.

If the PCT is strapped for cash or genuinely underestimates the need of its population, it will contract to treat too few patients. Even if the hospital does not go on to treat extra patients beyond the agreement, it may well be in the position of having treated all its allocation of funded patients by about the ninth month of its year and then be faced with the choice of making staff redundant or else trying to import patients from the areas of better-funded PCTs to keep staff and facilities occupied. Patients from its own population then have to watch others being treated in their hospital while they wait.

It is no wonder that even dedicated staff who enjoy treating patients are now "voting with their feet" and leaving the uncertainties of NHS employment.

Sir - As a GP practising in Suffolk, I share your concerns about Ipswich Hospital being punished for being too efficient.

Apparently £2.4 million of surgical work was not paid for by the PCT because it was done before the 122-day limit. If Ipswich had the capacity to do the work early, this would please patients and local GPs alike. Failure of the PCT to pay for work done too efficiently cannot be right, but we have to accept that they have finite budgets.

Why on earth is the payment not simply delayed for up to 122 days, instead of being forfeited because of a clever contractual clause? A fair early day's work can then be balanced against a fair but delayed day's pay. Ipswich Hospital is an excellent unit and deserves the same fair treatment it dispenses.

Dr John Havard, Saxmundham, Suffolk

Growing bananas in the garden

Sir - The banana harvest at Clare College, Cambridge (report, August 2) is not unique. I also have a tree producing bananas in my garden on the edge of the Fleet in Dorset.

Flowers began to appear at the beginning of July and to attract numerous wasps. There are currently five bunches on the plant, which is five years old and grows quite happily in a sheltered spot next to apple and palm trees.

I believe it is the Japanese banana plant Musa basjoo and that the bananas will probably be rather small and inedible when ripe. However, it would be rather a coup to present them as home-grown produce at the local farmers' market.

D. E. Gardner, Weymouth, Dorset

Taxing havens

Sir - Reading that the Rolling Stones have managed to stash away their millions in offshore accounts (report, August 2), I feel compelled to write about the escalating consequences of the increasing popularity among the world's financial elite of using such tax havens.

Offshore banking has become seriously big business, with estimates that unpaid taxes could be as much as $255 billion a year - much more than the estimated $195 billion needed to halve world poverty in a decade. Offshore banking is highly unprincipled and morally indefensible.

While billions of dollars sit in virtual banks evading the taxman, millions of humans continue to die from hunger, disease, and poverty.

Benjamin Radley, Malvern, Worcs

Cherwell's decline

Sir - Recently I stayed by the Cherwell in Oxford and was dismayed at the state of the river (Letters, August 2). In years gone by, the Cherwell has been an idyllic haven enjoyed by all ages, town and gown alike. Thousands of people have appreciated punting or being punted along this wonderful tranquil river - an experience not many other cities can offer.

The Cherwell is no longer that attractive river on which to spend a sunny afternoon. It is now difficult and dangerous to navigate because of fallen trees and general debris. It is a tragedy that the Oxford canal and the Cherwell - such symbols of Oxford - have been allowed to get into such a state.

Jo Maxton, York

Heavy manoeuvres

Sir - Peter Forrest (Letters, August 3) may think the correct answer to the multiple choice question of what an HGV driver should do when overtaking another HGV on a uphill gradient is "ease off and fall behind the vehicle you were trying to overtake".

However, all HGV drivers know that the correct answer is to pull alongside the vehicle you are trying to overtake and stay there for mile after mile, especially on a dual carriageway. This ensures maximum delay to all other drivers by effectively blocking the dual carriageway.

An element of fun is also achieved by keeping in this position for 20 miles or so, then pulling over and continuing at the same speed as the overtaken vehicle for the rest of the journey. Watching the furious reaction of overtaking car drivers after such a manoeuvre obviously breaks up the boredom on their long journeys.

Chris Williamson, Worksop, Notts

Kitchen filth

Sir - We are now more than half-way through the BBC's excellent series Trawlermen and yet, despite unbelievable battles with mother nature, what she throws at them and what she surrenders in terms of harvest, I have not yet heard a single swear word.

The captains and crews demonstrate a camaraderie and cheerfulness that is a salutary lesson to us all. What a comparison, and indeed example, to those foul-mouthed yobs we are shown working in their warm, cosy and stable kitchens in the so-called haute cuisine programmes.

Gerald Fisher, Kettering, Northants

Speaking of words

Sir - I once heard the word "guffaw" spoken (Letters, August 3). As a treat one day during the war, my boys-only college in the West Indies showed a Charlie Chaplin film. The principal, an Irish priest, introduced it by telling the boys: "You may laugh, but no guffawing."

H. W. Scott, Hemel Hempstead, Herts

Sir - One of the last utterances of Charles II was an apology for taking such an unconscionable time dying. He can't have been feeling all that ill, to get his tongue round such a word.